10 Horror Movie Opening Fakeouts We All Fell For

Those horror movie openings which totally messed with our expectations.

By Andrew Pollard /

One of the great things about the world of horror, is the magnificent way the genre can manipulate your expectations and forever keep you guessing. Just when you think a horror film is about to veer left, it'll swiftly turn right, with twists and major swerves often the order of the day.

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Of course, such happenings are usually associated with the end of a horror picture, delivering a jaw-dropping final act revelation that nobody saw coming. However, it isn't just the conclusion of a film that can leave you with such a feeling, for certain horrors may use their opening moments to mess with your expectations thanks to a good ol' fakeout.

At times, these openings may set a movie up to be one thing, only to drastically change path to being something else entirely. For other films, they may position one particular character as being the clear central focus, just to dump that character on the sidelines. And then there are those features which take a meta approach that plays with the usual established rules and lore of horror.

With all of that in mind, then, here are ten such horror movies that fooled up all with some fantastic opening act fakeouts.

10. Stage Fright

Directed by Michele Soavi, 1987's Stage Fright centres on a locked-down theatre terrorised by an owl-masked killer known as the Night Owl. So, when the film opens with the Night Owl slaughtering a prostitute in an alley, you rightfully think you've been fully introduced to this murderous beast.

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What happens next comes properly out of left-field, though, for as the locals start to investigate the blood-curdling screams of this poor woman, the Night Owl jumps over their heads and starts a bonkers dance routine.

Yep, it then becomes apparent that what we've actually watched was merely a group of actors rehearsing a musical production based around the Night Owl. We're then introduced to the bulk of our key players, before the tyrannical director of this musical insists that the cast and crew stay late for yet another run through of certain scenes - even after one of them is killed for real!

Unbeknownst to our central characters, the theatre doors are locked, they're without a key, and the dead bodies begin to amass as an escaped lunatic - and former actor - has donned the Night Owl outfit as part of his latest murder spree.

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